Hardwood flooring has long been an elegant and desirable floor covering for use in homes. Such flooring typically consists of elongated strips of lumber arranged adjacent to one another and nailed in place to cover a selected area. In order to provide the beautiful appearance typical of hardwood floors, the strips of lumber must be carefully chosen to be defect free. Hence, only lumber of the highest quality may be used for such flooring. As the availability of this high-quality lumber began to dwindle, it was inevitable that hardwood flooring would become more expensive. Today, the cost of such flooring is so prohibitive that it is not economically feasible to provide less costly homes with hardwood floors.
Any attempt to produce floorboards from an inferior-quality lumber would result in an aesthetically unappealing product. Thus, inferior lumbers contain defects which must be removed before the lumber can be used as a flooring material. Since the defects occur at random locations throughout the lumber, the most efficient use of the lumber results in the formation of floorboards having a variety of random lengths. Many of these lengths are extremely short and essentially unusable, therefore becoming scrap material.
There therefore exists a need for a floorboard which is aesthetically pleasing but sufficiently inexpensive that it may be used to provide hardwood floors in even less costly homes. In particular, the needs exists for a floorboard which may be produced from lumber of an inferior quality while, at the same time, making efficient use of such lumber with minimal waste.